Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Dry Flush does away with holding tanks, smells, frozen plumbing

Imagine an RV trip without having to dump black water. No fooling with holding tank treatments. No getting bowled over by "toilet stink" on hot days. All these benefits are yours, says a Connecticut company, if you install one of their new Dry Flush toilet systems in your RV.

Dry Flush takes away the holding tank and replaces it (inside the toilet) with a 'waste disposal system,' that wraps up the waste after every flush in what almost looks like aluminum foil. After 15 flushes the containerized waste is removed from the toilet, a new containment cartridge (if you will) installed, and the filled up system is tossed out in the trash. Kind of reminds us of those automatic cat litter-box systems where you never have to touch a litter scoop.

The Dry Flush toilet has the appearance of many an RV toilet and operates on 12-volt power--not a lot of it, mind you, drawing 5 amps for the duration of a "flush" cycle, which appears to be just a few seconds. You can hook Dry Flush up to your RV battery electrical system, use a shore power adapter, or lug the thing and use it just about anywhere with an optional battery pack that gives 300 flushes.

Here are a few plus points: Since there's no water hookup required, you'll be able to get relief even in below-freezing weather. No spills, no stink, and the system is portable. Scaling in at a little over 20 pounds (without the optional five pound battery) its easy to move--we assume this to be "dry weight."

On the other hand, finances will need a little consideration. The Dry Flush toilet itself retails for $585. Once you've bought the system, you'll need to keep up with the "refills" to keep it happy. Refills are sold in packs of three for $49.95 each. That's a $1.11 every time you "ascend to the throne," which if airlines charged us for use of the in-flight biffy might cause a bit of a stink.

Learn more about the system on the company website. Got questions or want to put in an order? Call Dry Flush directly at 203-248-4440.

I don't think the HAZMAT humanure is more dangerous than the dog crap we throw in the garbage without consideration, but we're talking about big volume, here. Fifteen full-sized flushes would constitute some weight, and is maybe two days' worth for a couple.

Hey, have you talked about composting toilets for RVs? For boondockers, it's an idea whose time has come. I wrote about ours here.

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